Joan Backes is an internationally renowned artist, and has shown in Germany, Scotland, Sweden, Iceland, Finland, Thailand, Canada, Argentina, and Chile, along with numerous places in the United States. Her work carefully examines the tree as a material and a concept. She dissects the tree almost obsessively, and looks at every physical and conceptual aspect, creating carpets of laminated leaves, painting detailed and accurate images of bark, taking crayon and graphite bark rubbings, and building installations and sculptures out of limbs and branches. Because of the universality of the tree as a symbol across cultures and generations, the resulting work touches a primal part of human imagination, and recalls a broad spectrum of literature, folklore, and art.